Ripped Jeans

Have kids that manage to tear holes in thier jeans?

Well I found a solution- at least temporary. When the hole is starting I get my CLEAR nail polish and went over the threads (on the inside if possible). It seems to have enough bonding to keep the threads from naturally ripping apart- at least for a while. This keeps the jeans "nice" because as a working mom I can't afford to buy new jeans every time they rip a hole in their good ones...

Now- if I can only get them to remember to change out of thier school jeans and into thier play (i.e. the jeans with holes already) after school. That would help, too.

Make Someone's Day

Want to make someone's day, but don't have time/money/creativity? My husband and I are constantly hiding sweet notes to each other.

Write a quick note and put it where you know they will see it (like in thier sock drawer, or their car seat). It can be for anyone, not just a lovey dovey note (though they are the best). I'm sitting here looking at a note my daughter wrote me and it just makes me smile.

It says:
Dear mom,
I love you (and that repeats about 23 times)

How to make the Koolaid last

I hope Koolaid isn't copyrighted or anything crazy that I need to change my title.

Anyway we had less than half a quart and 3 thirsty kids that ALL wanted the same thing to drink... Normally I'm stingy with ice. Well tonight was one of those "special" dinners where the kids got ice with thier drinks and we were able to stretch the last of that container of drink out amongst all the kids.

Pretty clever... and no one asked for more. *shew* We covered that by telling them it was gone and if they were still thirsty they would have to settle for water.

stretching

When you are stretching be sure to not to have anything restrict your body. I have found that 85% of my "pulled" neck musces or "slept wrongs" are from bad morning stretches.

I royally screwed up my back muscle this morning because I was propped up on an elbow when I stretched and my back didn't get to stretch right and my back muscle has been sore all day. I know it was because I didn't get it stretched right.

Bad Weather

Something we experienced recently with the coming of spring and winter leaving... bad storms. We had a tornado warning. After the alarm sounded for 15 seconds and I checked the t.v. to see what it was I THEN herded the children to a closet.

My advice is to act first- check it out later. The old saying better safe than sorry...

In your home you should always have a plan of what to do and where to do in case of an emergency. This one was poorly executed, at least at first. We plan to talk to the children on other things as well- such as fire emergency, poison control (the number is on our fridge), and other things. It's important they know what to do in case something happens to the adult.

My children are older, but I know they can still panic and get scared and forget. They have drills at school, why not some kind of drill at home? Sounds dorky- but it could save a life! I never thought about it before.

Saving Money

That's right, I have a small solution to help little people save money- and it works! Keep in mind it is a slow process but it WORKS. I promise. It worked for me.

I was living from paycheck to paycheck and many of my checks were spoken for before I even worked the hours! I had no savings what so ever. If something went wrong (say- I needed to fix the breaks on my car) I was in HUGE trouble because I simply did not have any extra money! Life was a financial nightmare.

I wanted a savings, like when I was a teenager, but I was too stingy about it because most banks have a minimum of $200 or $300 and if you don't have that balance you have to pay a small fee. I was not about to let them have my hard earned money!

Well here is my solution- get over it (I will explain in a monent). I tried and tried, and could never save that much money on my own to bring into the bank, because face it- $20 is a lot of stinkin money- much less $200! No amount of money lasted in my house, even if I hid it from myself!

So I sucked it up and went to my bank and opened up a savings. I tried to scrape up a little bit of cash, I couldn't even set it up with even an amount of $20. I just coudn't part with it. I had mouths to feed!

**these days a lot of banks even have those "open an account with us and we'll deposite $50 (or $100) coupons"

So I started direct depositing (it is easier if you direct deposit, if not then you MUST remember to automatically do it when you cash your check)- no joke $5 into my savings. I communicated to my bank and they waived the fee for being under the minimum (you could also put the account in a child's name to get past this fee if you choose- I didn't want to I wanted MY account). Turns out they didn't waive the minmum some "error" but I just sucked it up and took it. I NEEDED the savings.

The $5 dollars was easy to part with per check. I didn't miss it at all. Yeah it would take FOREVER to build up your savings (and it did), but hey- that is an extra $5 you are NOT spending. It DOES build up. After a few weeks I bumped it up to $10, then another few weeks I bumped my amount to $15, and so on. I made a goal to reach $50 per check to put into my savings.

It really did work. It took a long time for the amount of money in my savings to really feel like I had a coushin- but when I saw my first $100 I was so proud of myself! When my car DID need some work and I took the $300 out of my savings to pay for it- that felt WONDERFUL.

Stick to it. Remember you can't save $1000 overnight! if $1000 is your goal, then set a reasonable goal and work at it. You will get there. Be patient. Don't be discouraged if you have to 'dip into the savings' for something. That is what it is there for!

Potty Training

My suggestion is first thing is get your patience and nerves ready! Decide how you're going to go about it- and stick to it. I went back and forth with different suggested techniques with my first child and it was a disaster until I just stuck to my guns on HOW we were going to go about doing it and I made sure babysitters and everyone else was on the same page as me- this is HOW we are doing it at home and this is HOW we need to be doing it everywhere else. Because doing it one way one place and another way somewhere else was too confusing and I think in the end is what caused him a lot of frustration.

That and once you start- don't stop! All the pediatritions say "if they're not ready, stop for a while..." No, I would say don't. I don't know why they say that because when I would see that he started to get frustrated and freak out (of course they do when it's new and scary and they haven't done it before). I would stop after a couple months of trying- that is what Dr's say right?? Well after a while it got to the point where HE was manipulating ME. He knew that if he only cried hard enough, got upset enough, or freaked out enough- that I would go back to diapers and all would be "safe" again for him, right?

Potty training was no fun the 2nd time around either, but once I started I did NOT stop and (perhaps becuase I had learned a lot the first time) it was over a lot sooner... I am not going to say it was easier becuase I don't think it was!

Now here is how I would start:
Start by preparing the child for what you're about to do. Books and videos are a GREAT tool. I utilized any I could get my hands on- I love variety. I talked about our bodies and what they do- and what big people do when we have to go. I let them flush the potty if they wanted or throw something in to watch it go away. My daughter was scared so I told her she didn't have to until she was ready.

Basically I did "baby steps" when it came to the potty training. I talked about it, read bout it, and let them know soon "this is what we're going to do" and eased them into it. I tried to let her feel like she was in control as much as possible.

For example, I let her decide if she wanted a little seat for the house, a seat "just for her" which she loved, and where she was going to put it. And for going places, what kind of seat to go over big potties.

After we got the seat, we decided on "rewards" for making it into the potty and how all this good stuff would happen. You can do charts, stickers, anything the child will like. Gavin wanted a monster truck REALLY bad so once we got down to it and he knew he had to go in it he had to go 30 days no accidents, we made a special calendar, and he got his monster truck! In the mean time he got stickers for going.

I always helped them with the wiping at first, but once they were going on a regular basis I started to teach them the proper way to do it. The flushable wipes were a real life saver here. They are kind of pricey, but I think it helps with the transition, for when they started to wipe on their own and were throwing them in the potty.

I would reward the good behavior and ignore the bad behavior. Don't punish accidents- at least not until they get the hang of it. Later on when I knew they knew, I would have them rinse out their own wet pants and "help" me with the laundry (that really decreased the accidents because it was no fun).

ps, I used to hold thier hands when they first started actually going in the potty. It had to be a lot different and scarier than "just going" in their diaper! It helped.